Issue 161-M

مجلة النفط والتعاون العربي

161

العدد

- 2017

أربعون

المجلد الثالث و ال

2016

أوابك العلمية لعام

�

ص لبحوث العلمية الفائزة بجائزة

�

عدد خا

while production capacity is expected to be about 56.5 million tons indicating

large surplus capacity and low utilization of plants.

* Most collection and re-refining schemes need the support and subsidy of

governments or charges levied on lubricants consumers for the purpose. This is a

social cost to avoid impact on the environment and the loss of resources.

* Italy is an example of success and cooperation between the government and the

companies where in 1984 "The Compulsory Consortium of Used Oil (COOU)"

was established to foresee the collection, testing and allocation of used oil to re-

refiners. Financed by a levy on lubricants sale, the generators of used oils are

obliged to give the oil without charge.

* Information about the lubricating oil industry in the Arab World is hard to come

by. The expansion of the last few years is significant in adding capacity and

shifting from Group I base oils to Groups II and III.

* The region is of low oil drain interval around 2000 to 3000 kilometers though

this behavior is slowly changing. The virgin base oil production capacity in the

Arab countries will be more than three million tons a year by the end of 2016

while consumption is about 1.7 million tons. Re-refining is gaining ground at

slow pace where some operators strictly do filtration to remove insoluble and

export the products to less demanding markets. Uncontrolled burning is also

reported.

* The existence of five plants in Saudi Arabia having a total capacity of 100

thousand tons a year is much lower than other reported capacities. The UAE re-

refining capacity at 200 to 250 thousand tons a yearis much higher than the

domestically generated used oil. In both Saudi Arabia and the UAE, major

lubricants manufacturers complain about the state of the re-refining industry with

the growing issue of counterfeiting.